


just past the bend in the road

by vienna_salvatori



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Non-Magical, M/M, Swearing, disaster queers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-21
Updated: 2020-03-21
Packaged: 2021-03-01 03:47:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,065
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23228863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vienna_salvatori/pseuds/vienna_salvatori
Summary: Severus Snape is a bitter employee of mining company Riddle Incorporated, specialising in geochemistry at one of its most productive sites. Sirius Black is the irritating punk who keeps chaining himself to the road, protesting the company’s history of environmental violations.Remus Lupin would really just like to get his archaeological assessment done, thank you very much. Preferably without making lifelong enemies. Or falling in love in the process.
Relationships: Sirius Black/Remus Lupin
Comments: 15
Kudos: 104





	just past the bend in the road

The man in the middle of the road looks decidedly unimpressed when Remus’ truck rolls to a halt less than a foot from his toes. Remus, for his part, thinks he’s an utter idiot. His truck is held together with duct tape, for goodness sake. It’s almost a miracle that the brakes even decided to work this morning, or that Remus himself was awake enough to realise he had to use them.

Scowling slightly, he yanks the door open and jumps out, gravel crunching underneath his feet. His breath curls in cold morning air, and a few tepid rays of sunlight are beginning to creep over the horizon. Remus scowls, hunches further into his jacket, and circles around to the front of his car, bracing himself for a trying conversation.

The man grins at him, raising a thermos of tea in a mocking salute. ‘Morning!!!’

Fuck, it’s way too early for this.

Remus just nods, glaring. He doesn’t want to deal with this. He wants to get into the field, do his survey, preferably with minimal human interaction and as many opportunities to stare thoughtfully over the hills of Scotland with his hot chocolate in hand as possible, and then go home. Instead, he’s apparently going to have to deal with… this. Whatever “this” is. So he glares, and waits for the man to speak.

He hesitates, looking slightly nervous. Remus frowns for a moment, wondering how a scrawny academic in a cardigan could ever be intimidating to a man who didn’t flinch at the site of a car bearing down on him. Then he shrugs, mentally. Most of his colleagues tend to avoid him in the mornings anyway. Maybe there’s a reason.

‘Well, hello!’ the man says, forcibly cheerful and far too energetic for five in the fucking morning. ‘Would you, good sir, be interested in hearing about the terrible environmental legacies the mine ahead of you is responsible for?’

‘… no?’ Maybe, under other circumstances, he would be. But. Well. Five. O’clock. In. The. _Fucking_. Morning.

‘Great!’, he continues, undeterred. ‘I don’t know how much you’ve heard about Riddle Incorporated, but they’ve been a big name in a bunch of different industries since the fifties. It was founded by a bunch of public-school rich kids with nothing to do but make themselves richer, so, y’know. A bunch of assholes. Believe me, I know. My family’s full of them.’

Remus blinks. Somehow, he can’t see the guy in front of him- long, windswept hair, leather jacket, tattoos poking out from under his shirt- fitting in with high society types. At all. Then he reminds himself that he’s busy.

‘I’m sure this is fascinating, but I really need to get through’, Remus interrupts. ‘I’m supposed to be writing a heritage report on this area, which I can’t do if you won’t let me down the road.’

At this, the man leans forward, smiling slightly. ‘Heritage report? As in, something that could cause trouble for these bastards?’

Remus shrugs, slightly. ‘That depends on what kind of heritage I find.’

The man eyes him for a moment later, then slumps back in his chair. ‘I’d love to help you, really, but I can’t.’

‘what do you mean, you-’

Oh, he didn’t.

‘…’

‘…’

‘Did you superglue your deck chair to the road?’

‘… possibly?’

Remus stares at him in disbelief. ‘Mr…’

‘Black. Sirius Black’, the man says, attempting to sound suave and mysterious while sitting in a bright yellow deck chair he’s superglued to the middle of a road in the absolute middle of nowhere.

‘Sirius. You do realise that a plastic chair is not going to stop a mining truck for very long?’

‘Probably not’, he admits, with a slight shrug. ‘Have you got any better ideas?’

Remus stares at him in shock, then shakes his head and turns back towards his truck. ‘Try something a bit heavier’, he calls back. ‘Or find yourself some friends!’

With that, he hops back into his truck, starts it up again, and reverses away from Sirius. He cuts a particularly absurd figure in Remus’ headlights, sprawled awkwardly on a plastic deck chair, attempting to look relaxed and not like he’s freezing his ass off in the bitter Scottish morning air.

Shaking his head slightly, Remus shifts gears, and accelerates around Sirius. His truck bounces wildly as he hits the edge of the road, and continued to bounce even more as he crashes through the undergrowth- but, by some miracle, stays in one piece. (Mostly. Ignoring that piece of the bumper which he was definitely planning to replace anyway.)

Out of his rear-view mirror- which, yes, is attached with duct tape, why do you ask- Remus can see Sirius, practically doubled over laughing.

* * *

‘Mr Lupin’.

‘Professor Snape’, he returns, smiling politely at the man. This meeting is happening far later than it should have, and Remus suspects that may have something to do with a certain protester on the only road in. This probably shouldn’t amuse him as much as it does, but he does a good job of remaining professional.

‘You requested access to the refinery structures, did you not?’

Remus nods, quickly. ‘Some of these buildings date to the earliest phases of operation here’, he explains. ‘It’s possible that they would qualify as part of the industrial heritage of the area, and that would need to be considered before the plans for the refinery expansions could be approved.’

Professor Snape scowls. ‘And this is… the only reason you desire access to these facilities?’

‘Yes?’ Remus offers, somewhat bewildered. Snape doesn’t look convinced.

‘You do realise that some of the work performed here lies at the heart of the economic success of this company? There are certain… competitors… of ours who would go to great lengths to see my work!’ 

It looks as if Snape is liable to continue ranting for quite some time, so Remus quickly interrupts. ‘That’s… nice? I was, ah, quite interested in the timbers in your ceiling, actually.’ Snape looks disbelieving, so he adds, ‘if it’s all right, I’d like to try and get some dendrochronology dates for the structural timbers here, and see if I can work out when the buildings were constructed.’

Snape glowers at him for a few moments more. ‘You can look at your… timbers’, he hisses. ‘I will accompany you. Don’t. Touch. Anything.’

Remus smiles, raising his hands in surrender. ‘Of course not. Lead the way, professor.’

Snape scowls again- well, not really _again_ since he hadn’t stopped scowling in the first place, but his scowl becomes even deeper. Regardless, he turns dramatically and leads the way further into the building. Remus follows obediently, looking around in curiosity. It’s a pretty industrial construction, all red brick walls and nice square corners… although it certainly hasn’t been well maintained, with grime-coated walls faded to a dull, almost brown colour that looks like it’s trying to blend in with the ground outside.

The technology, on the other hand, is immaculate- old, sure, but obviously cared for. Remus has spent enough time stuck in varies laboratories that he draws two immediate conclusions: Severus Snape treats his equipment with far more care than any school or university Remus has ever seen; and whatever is going on here is so far above his skill level he wouldn’t want to do so much as light a Bunsen burner in this place.

Remus thought… well, honestly, he wasn’t sure what a mining lab would look like. His memory of geology labs was very much an overabundance of rock samples, _possibly_ some microscopes, and only minimal concessions to the concept of lab safety. Instead, he feels like he’s walked into the lair of a mad scientist- all bubbling test tubes, whirring centrifuges, and odd-looking fumes coming off of brightly coloured solutions in beakers. The only thing he got right was the lack of concessions to lab safety- just looking at the tangle of glass tubing suspended over the tables gives him a headache, and he’s quite sure that no one other than Snape could work in this place without breaking something. Or blowing something up. Or dissolving something. Or-

‘I can’t see any timbers in this building. Can we move on, or are you too busy gaping at something which is none of your concern?’

Remus jerks, and smiles apologetically at Snape, although his smile withers under the glare. ‘Of course not. I wasn’t expecting such an… impressive setup, that’s all. Should we move on?’

This time, Snape gestures for him to take the lead, so he moves ahead cautiously. The lighting in this place is almost criminally poor- seriously, Remus is sure it breaks all kinds of safety regulations- but he can just about make out a doorway in one wall, and begins working his way towards it.

‘I’m sure the equipment here must be daunting to you.’ The man’s voice is soft, and Remus fights back the overwhelming urge to ask him where he took his drama lessons. Instead, he just shrugs noncommittally and continues towards the door, keeping as far away from a precariously balanced jar of acid as he can.

‘Such a pity’, Severus continues, ‘that you won’t understand the brilliance of what goes on here. I have brewed fame and bottled glory in this lab! And you come through, far too focused on-’

‘Doing my job?’

‘silly little details of the past for you to see the future at work!’

Okay, now Remus is fighting the urge to punch him in the face.

They’ve reached the door, though, so he restrains himself to yanking on the handle with slightly more force than is strictly necessary, and steps out into the weak morning light. There’s a small cluster of buildings scattered around the clearing in front of him, the edge of the slag heap of the mine itself casting the whole area into shadow. Even so, the whole place still feels darker and colder than it has any right to be.

Some of the structures are definitively brutalist in nature, and he mentally assigns them WW2-era at the earliest- still worth a look, just in case there’s some kind of military history he doesn’t know about, but unlikely to require much time. Closer to the slag heap, though- so close they almost look like they’re being swallowed by it- are a couple of older structures. Eighteenth century, at a guess. Maybe an old mill.

He nods to himself, and turns towards his car, only to find Snape still watching him. ‘Are you going to follow me around all day?’

‘How long are you planning to spy on our work?’

‘I’m not spying.’ Remus sighs, and starts heading for his car. ‘I’m surveying. If you’re going to insist on following me, you can at least make yourself useful and hold a tape measure.’

Snape still doesn’t look impressed and stalks behind him as he goes to collect his gear. Oh well. He can spend the day watching Remus measure things if he really wants to. Snape’s glare might be impressive, but it’s not too distracting. At least, not in comparison to that of a site surveyor checking in every five minutes to see if you’ve proved their pet theory yet. (It’s been years, but Remus _still_ checks over his shoulder for anyone yelling about Anglo-Saxon sunken feature buildings every time he spots a post hole.)

* * *

Sirius is not sitting on a plastic deck chair, this time.

Remus applies his brakes well before reaching the stretch of road which Sirius has chosen to inhabit, meaning he rolls to a stop slightly further back, with minimal risk of running over Sirius’s toes. Unfortunately, this means he has to get out of the car in order to properly see _exactly_ what he’s decided to set up, this time.

Sirius smirks slightly as he approaches. Remus, for his part, is speechless.

‘You did tell me to find something heavier.’

‘… Yes. Yes I did.’

Sirius is sitting on a very, _very_ large weight, the side of which proudly proclaims it to be “16 TONS”. It is… Monty Python-esque, he supposes, and says as much. Sirius grins at that, and chucks a raspberry at him.

‘So’, Sirius says, once it’s clear that Remus isn’t about to peg the fruit back at him. ‘How did your trip inside the lion’s den go yesterday, intrepid archaeologist friend of mine?’

Remus shrugs. ‘I think Professor Snape tried to accuse me of industrial espionage? And, uh, it’s Remus. Remus Lupin.’

Sirius barks out a laugh. ‘Nice to meet you, Remus. Yeah, that sounds like Snivellus. He always thinks people are plotting. How much time did you lose to his infamous brewing fame speech?’

‘It’s infamous?’

Sirius pulls another raspberry out of the punnet, tosses it in the air, tries to catch it with his mouth, misses, and stares at the red splotch on the ground in despair. ‘Hmm? Oh, yeah. Apparently, he gives it to everyone who bothers him in his lab. I swear, the guy exists just to be dramatic.’

‘You know him, then?’

‘Unfortunately. As I said, Riddle Inc are a bunch of rich assholes, and I’m unlucky enough to be acquainted with most of ‘em. Snape’s actually the exception, apparently he’s there on talent, although I wonder if that’s just a talent for sucking up to the right person.’

‘Well, his lab’s certainly impressive. I don’t think I could understand half of what he was trying to do.’

‘You definitely wouldn’t be allowed in there long enough to work it out! Paranoid git.’ Sirius shuffles, slightly, and Remus is slightly concerned to notice that the massive weight doesn’t move at all underneath him. There’s no way it’s _actually_ 16 tons, but he’s still wondering how on Earth Sirius managed to get the thing here.

Not interested enough to ask- it’s barely gone five in the morning, after all- but. Interested.

‘Snape spent eight hours yesterday watching me measure the size of the beam slots in the old mill building, rather than leave me alone with a pile of rusted machinery.’

Sirius barks out a laugh. ‘What did I say? Paranoid git. He’ll probably do it again today.’

‘Oh, that’s a pity. I’m sure he could find better things to do with his time than watch me measure bricks.’

‘… do you need to measure bricks?’

‘Not in the slightest. They’re industrially produced, I only really need to check one of them. They’ll probably even have a manufacturer’s mark on them. It’d be remiss of me not to utilise Snape’s _kind_ offer to accompany me through the building, though.’ Sirius laughs, again, so hard he comes perilously close to falling right off of his weight. The thing still doesn’t wobble in the slightest.

‘How long can you get them to pay you to distract Snivellus?’ he asks, once he’s finally recovered himself.

Remus shrugs. ‘Should I do a field walk for surface artefacts? Because a site of this size will take a while, he might have to accompany me over the moors for several days if he doesn’t want me to see the diggers. Or whatever else I’d find in the mine.’

‘Yes.’ Sirius tells him. ‘Lord, _yes_. Keep the mad scientist away from his experiments for as long as possible.’

Remus is quite startled to realise that he’s actually grinning. Despite it being five in the morning, miserably overcast, and absolutely freezing. He shakes his head slightly, and turns back towards his car.

‘I still think your protest would work better if you found some more people!’

* * *

The following morning dawns bright and clear, the kind of birds-chirping cheeriness that makes Remus want to strangle something and hide under his covers for hours. He’s got work to do, though, and drags himself down to his car and out towards the mine with blurry eyes, trying to remember if he packed the spare batteries for camera, or if he’s going to be forced to spend several hours inside with the charger, his every move watched by a proprietary chemistry professor.

He’s almost at the site when he remembers the _other_ thing he’s likely to encounter this morning, and- much to his surprise- he finds his mood brightening. Maybe Sirius will have found someone to help him in his absurd quest.

He has not. He’s waiting on his weight again- Remus is torn between pride and disbelief at the fact that his stupid throwaway comment apparently had such an impact- but he’s the only one.

Well, for now. A truck full of mine workers is edging past the man, and Remus watches in disbelief as he shouts something into a megaphone, either oblivious to or not caring that everyone inside has the windows up and earmuffs on.

Sirius also, it turns out, has an enormous sign, which he turns in Remus’ direction the moment he spots his battered car rumbling along.

“DON’T MINE”, it reads. “BE MINE.”

It is, quite possibly, the cheesiest thing Remus has ever read.

‘Do you like it?’ he asks excitedly through the megaphone, when Remus pulls up alongside him, the window rolled down.

He flinches at the volume, and Sirius sheepishly lowers the megaphone. ‘It’s… to the point’, Remus offers, weakly.

‘Isn’t it?’ Sirius grins widely, like he really _does_ think it’s the best thing on the planet. Remus reaches for his thermos of hot chocolate and takes a sip in order to hide the grin which is threatening to overcome his own face. ‘Not too much text to read, and it’s got a pun. Puns are the best. I’ll get lots of support with puns.’

‘And maybe even a girlfriend, assuming they don’t run away at the sight of your terrible pick up line?’

There’s a pause, and Remus wonders if he’s mis-stepped, but Sirius just nods. ‘Girlfriend… sure, yeah, that’d be good. Why not, eh?’

The ensuing silence starts awkwardly and only gets worse as it drags on, so Remus just coughs, mutters ‘good luck with the recruitment’, and drives on, careful not to look back at Sirius. This isn’t too hard- his rear-view mirror fell off last night, and he hasn’t gotten around to fixing it.

* * *

‘How much longer do you intend to be doing this?’

Severus Snape has, indeed, followed Remus on his field walk. He isn’t sure why. The man looked utterly miserable just sitting outside yesterday, and Remus actually thought he might have finally gotten time to himself when he set off into the windswept fields surrounding the mine. Snape had followed, though. Obviously grudgingly, but apparently not enough so to actually let him out of sight.

Remus shrugs, scribbles a note on the native fauna- a selection of grasses and sedges but not a whole lot else- and determinedly does not look in the direction of his unwanted shadow. ‘I usually work until dark in the field’, he admits. ‘But there’s no reason for you to accompany me if you want to go back.’

Over the past few days, Remus has been forced to re-evaluate his opinion on the strength of Severus Snape’s glare. He’d thought, mistakenly, that nothing could ever match the mania of an archaeologist waiting for the find of their career. Or the one which would prove their theory right and mean their co-workers would buy them drinks at the pub that evening. (usually, the latter of those circumstances resulted in far more frenzied searching than the former). He’d assumed- reasonably, or so he thought- that a chemist who’d ended up working for a private company in the back end of nowhere would be pathetic in comparison.

He’d assumed wrong. Severus Snape possessed a singularly nasty glare, which felt like knives boring into his back, and it was _relentless_. If he was a weaker man, he may well have decided to abandon the project entirely, just to get away from the dour chemist that had set about tracking his every move.

Perhaps that was the point of the glare, Remus mused. Perhaps the real reason he was hired by Riddle Inc was to deter nosy archaeologists, and consultants, and environmental inspectors, from attempting a proper assessment. Goodness knows the man hadn’t spent a whole lot of time in the lab recently.

‘I’m thinking I’ll only set out one more quadrant’, Remus admits. ‘With all the vehicles moving through the area, it’s unlikely artefacts would have survived on the surface, but I still need to back up that claim.’

Severus nods, and starts striding up the hill before realising Remus isn’t following him. He jerks an eyebrow. ‘Are you planning to do your job anytime soon?’

‘Yes, but… Well, I’m interested in heading downhill, actually.’

Instantly, Snape’s demeanour becomes even colder than he’d seen before. ‘I’m sure there’s nothing of interest down there.’

‘Well…’

‘It’s unstable’, the man snaps. ‘Either set up your grids up here, or head home.’

‘Okay’, Remus promises, quickly. ‘Okay, I’ll work up here.’

_What doesn’t he want me to see?_

* * *

The following day is spent with aerial photographs of the area- luckily enough, the collections for Scotland are available online and he doesn’t need to head all the way to Edinburgh, like he first suspected.

It’s… odd, is what it is. Remus’ first thought was that Snape- and, by extension, Riddle Inc- were aware of some kind of historical site in the area they wanted to keep him away from. Nothing shows up, though. They’re far enough north not to see too many of the distinctive playing-card shapes of Roman marching forts. He stares at photographs of the surrounding fields until his eyes hurt and can’t find anything which could, even charitably, be called a roundhouse. Or any other kind of prehistoric structure.

In fact, for the UK, the area is almost suspiciously bare of archaeological features. He’d known that already, of course- he’d checked some of this before setting out to site for the first time- but it’s still a shock, realising just how empty it is.

If it isn’t archaeological, then what? The area Snape tried to keep him away shows almost nothing, just a bare patch of hillside, the line of darker vegetation which usually means a creek at the base of the hill.

Maybe the man was telling the truth when he said the area was unstable. Remus isn’t sure what else it could be.

* * *

‘Still no friends?’ Remus asks, when he wanders up to Sirius and his contraption. Still a 16-ton weight, apparently, although very noticeably rumpled, like it’s had an encounter with one or two vehicles and come off the worse for wear. The man’s smile brightens the moment he sees him.

‘I missed you, yesterday!’ he exclaims. ‘I was out here, all on my own, braving the bitter cold and dangerous wilds of Scotland, and you know who I had to deal with? _Snivellus_. And I didn’t even get to complain about it to you!’

‘Well, I’m here now,’ Remus says, before his brain fully processes what he’s saying. Luckily, it’s cold enough that his blush will be hidden, since his cheeks are already going red from the cold. Hopefully.

Sirius freezes for a moment, surprised, then launches himself into Remus’ arms. It takes him a moment to interpret the rush of limbs as a somewhat friendly hug rather than an attack, and he isn’t entirely sure what to do about it, so settles for patting the man awkwardly on the back as he mock sobs into Remus’ jacket. Eventually, he pulls back, leaning against the obstacle- it’s closer to the centre of the road, today, and potentially more of an actual roadblock, although Remus- and anyone else with even a basic four-wheel drive- will have no trouble getting around.

‘So, the archaeology treating you well? Not been, um, cursed by a vengeful pharaoh?’

‘Well enough.’ Remus smiles. I’d like to be cursed by a vengeful pharaoh, though. If I managed to find one out here to be cursed by, then I could write the paper of the century.’

‘I’ll see if I can rustle one up, then.’ Sirius is grinning entirely too much, so for the sake of his sanity, Remus decides to ignore it. ‘Ol’ Snivellus not giving you too much trouble?’

‘Not really… well, he did try and keep me away from the creek, but I’m damned if I know what that was about.’

Instantly, all of Sirius’s levity evaporates. ‘He didn’t want you near the creek?’ Remus is so startled at the change in tone that he barely manages to shake his head.

‘He’s got to know there’s something wrong. Water quality, maybe? Residues entering the water table? Acid drainage? Maybe they’re dumping sediment? Ugh, too many options!’

‘You think…’ Remus stops, takes a breath, and says in as normal a tone as he can manage, ‘he told me it was unstable. I thought he just wanted to go home and couldn’t be bothered shadowing me anymore.’ Sirius’s idea makes sense, though. He did a bit of research into Riddle Inc yesterday, too. (Not all of it was provoked by a particularly handsome protester with a terrible sense of humour, but Remus can’t deny that played a role in at least part of it.) They’re a shady group, although he’d found no concrete evidence of anything. Mismanagement of contaminants from the mine damaging the local environment… it wouldn’t be a surprise. ‘Even if you’re right… well, I’m doing a heritage assessment, not an environmental one. They already passed that.’

‘You mean they bought off the consultants.’

‘You’re serious?’

‘Yep, that’s me!’ Remus groans, and Sirius flashes a grin before his face turns sombre again. ‘The assessment was organised by a guy called Malfoy. Utter bastard, my cousin Cissa married him and she’s been no fun since. Anyway, he almost got done for insider trading a couple years back and has been fighting to look respectable ever since. Officially, he’s got nothing to do with this place. Unofficially, him and Riddle have been silent business partners for years.’

‘Insider trading is still a ways from faking a consultancy report, though.’

Sirius shrugs. ‘It’s a jump Lucius would be willing to make, I reckon.’

One of the mine workers pulls up, horn blaring, even as he edges his way around the two of them. The man shoots a dirty look in their direction. Remus smiles as politely as he can manage. Sirius flips him off.

‘Even if you’re right-’ and it’s a big if- ‘there’s no proof. And there’s no way Snape’s going to let me anywhere near that creek.’

‘Don’t worry about it’, Sirius assures him. There’s a gleam in his eyes which promises mischief, and Remus finds himself surprising disappointed he won’t get to see it. ‘Leave that part to me.’

* * *

Sirius is still there on Monday. He’s given up on the 16-ton weight, which is nice, and his deck chair doesn’t even seem to be glued down. He’s got a _very_ nice-looking motorcycle, too, parked off to the side of the road where it shouldn’t be in any danger from the mining trucks. There’s even a helmet sitting on the seat, so he’s practicing road safety!

Remus likes focusing on the positives of a situation before acknowledging the negatives.

‘Sirius, why did you wrap yourself in toilet paper?’

‘Well, you did say you wished you could find a mummy up here.’

‘You’re utterly insane.’

‘Yep! Too much inbreeding, I reckon.’ Remus laughs, waiting for him to join in. Sirius doesn’t. Fuck.

(He’d looked into the name “Sirius Black” at the same time as he looked into Riddle Inc. Just for balance, you understand. A good researcher always makes sure to recognise potential biases, rather than blindly trusting someone’s story. That’s the only reason he wanted to check out Sirius Black. Honest. There had been very little about the man himself, although the antics of the Black family- if he’d found the right one- were so utterly ridiculous there was no way any of the rumours were actually true. Except apparently at least some of them were. Fuck.)

‘Anyway’, Sirius says, with the ease of someone who’s had plenty of practise ignoring awkward situations, ‘Can you keep Snivellus away from the creek for a while today? I’d like to get some water samples.’

‘Isn’t that technically trespass?’

‘Nooooo, because I’m going to plant some alder seeds along the riparian zone of the creek as well, so it’s not trespassing, it’s guerrilla gardening.’

‘… you know, I’m not entirely sure I want to know what your thought process was for this plan.’

‘Probably for the best, yeah,’ Sirius admits. Then he grins. ‘My plans are so brilliant you’d be awestruck in my presence, and I’d hate for you to be left speechless!’

‘Speechless? Me?’ Remus jerks an eyebrow. ‘I assure you, it’s going to take more than a few clever plans to achieve that.’

‘So you do think my plan is clever!’

‘No, I-’ Remus sighs. ‘All right, you win that one.’

‘Thanks. So, Snivellus distraction?’

‘Yeah, sure. Why not. Try not to get yourself caught, though. And. Um. Don’t litter toilet paper?’

Sirius gives a mock salute, which incidentally leads to one of the strands of toilet paper he’s wrapped around his arm coming loose. He scrambles frantically after it as the wind tosses it over the field.

Remus shakes his head slightly, grinning, and heads back to his car. By the time he’s pulled up by Sirius’s spot, the man has managed to recover his lost “bandage”, although many of the others are now looking very sad and droopy. More than one is trailing in the mud.

Remus rolls down the window as he pulls up by Sirius. ‘Do you think you could get a sediment core as well as some water samples?’

‘Probably’, Sirius shrugs, fumbling awkwardly for several more “bandages” that come loose with the movement. ‘That’s helpful?’

‘Could be’, Remus tells him, before pressing down on the accelerator, calling over his shoulder as he goes, ‘good luck with the guerrilla gardening!’

* * *

For the first time, Sirius is still there when he leaves that evening.

It’s such a shock that Remus almost loses control of the car, staring at the man. Sirius is perched on his motorcycle, hunched over a thermos which looks to have stopped steaming quite some time ago. When he sees Remus coming, though, he leaps up and starts waving frantically.

Curious, he jerks on the steering wheel and bumps over the ditch at the side of the road. It’s not a very substantial ditch at this stage- Remus is far from the only driver who’s resorted to scraping the edge of the road to pass Sirius in the mornings, and it looks like one or two low-slung cars have scraped across the bank, levelling out the area far more than he was expecting.

Sirius probably would have had a far more successful protest if he’d set up half a mile down the road, at a proper bottleneck. Remus can’t help but wonder what he was actually trying to achieve, with this apparently futile exercise.

Oh well. He’s not going to complain about the man’s sanity, or lack thereof. He’s been good entertainment these last few mornings.

‘I got them’, Sirius says, once Remus has hopped out of the car. Triumphantly, the man shows him several thermoses in the pannier of his motorcycle. Remus frowns, confused, so the man unscrews the cap to one of them, revealing-

‘water from the creek’, he explains.

‘Right. It’s too dark for me to see what it is, other than liquid’, Remus admits. ‘Also, please tell me those were clean thermoses and you didn’t mix the water with your tea.’

‘Bought them brand new, specifically for this purpose’, Sirius tells him. ‘Look, this one reminded me of you!’

It has a wolf on it. Remus isn’t sure he sees the resemblance.

‘Anyway, I was wondering’, Sirius continues, carefully replacing the lid to the thermos and placing it back in the bag, ‘do you know a lab that would test these things?’

‘You… didn’t have that bit worked out already?’

Sirius sheepishly runs a hand through his hair. ‘Well. No?’

‘Most places won’t take it, if they think you didn’t have permission to collect it.’

‘I know that! I… I know that.’

Remus doesn’t want this to be his problem. He’s got his job. He’s good at this job. He likes his job! And his job, right now, is to do a heritage assessment for the mining operations here, _not_ to help some random punk who keeps badly chaining himself to the road in his quest to get one over his relatives, or whatever it is Sirius actually wants.

It isn’t his job. It _isn’t_. Working with Sirius on this could _lose_ him his job, or at least his contacts with the industry. He could be blacklisted by every major construction project for the next decade if he goes outside of his remit.

So why does he feel so desperate to help?

Remus pulls a notebook out of a pocket, along with a plumbob, five nails, four random pieces of bright orange string, several chocolate wrappers, one uneaten chocolate (hooray!), three more nails, and a shiny rock, before finally finding a pencil. He shoves most of it back, keeping only the notebook and the pencil.

Feeling like he isn’t quite in control of his body, Remus scrawls his phone number on an unused page, and passes it to Sirius. ‘No guarantees’, he warns. ‘But call me in a day or two, and I might be able to find someone who can help.’

Sirius folds the paper, one handed, and tucks it into a pocket in his jacket, trying to look cool except he’s grinning entirely too much to pull off the suave look. Remus can’t quite take his eyes off the man’s crooked grin.

Sirius manages to start up his motorbike before Remus coaxes his car into turning on again, and he follows the man down the winding road, back towards civilisation, his heart pounding at the thought of what he just promised. (Not promised, not technically, but when Remus says he’s going to help someone, he helps.)

That night, the sight of Sirius riding ahead of him- taking corners faster than Remus would dare, slowly but surely pulling out of sight- haunts his dreams until the morning comes, wreathed in mist.

* * *

Sirius isn’t waiting at his corner. Remus tries to pin his bad mood on the fact that Severus Snape has, yet again, taken an almost unhealthy interest in his work and follows him around like a schoolteacher looming over a misbehaving student. And while that certainly contributes- genius or not, Severus Snape is hardly pleasant company- he’s forced to admit that he’s actually begun to look forward to seeing Sirius.

Maybe he’ll be back tomorrow. Remus finds his thoughts drifting, wondering what kind of absurd performance the man will put on next. More than once, Snape snaps at him, asking what’s taking so long, and he’s dragged back to reality.

No Sirius Black, laughing and plotting. Just _this_ asshole, sneering away, and a building which really isn’t that interesting but needs to be recorded anyway.

Eventually, Remus decides to make himself useful.

‘So, what exactly are you studying, Severus?’

The man stiffens. ‘You think I’m just going to answer that?’

‘Well, I’d be a rather terrible spy, don’t you think?’ Remus offers, with the most disarming smile he can manage. It strains his cheeks to keep it, and he’s sure it doesn’t look sincere in the slightest. ‘Besides, as you’ve mentioned _several_ times now, I’m far too much of a dunderhead to ever hope of grasping the complexities of it. Surely it wouldn’t hurt just to explain the basics.’

Severus just huffs.

‘It’s just, I don’t exactly understand what a geochemist actually _does_ ’, Remus says, earnestly. ‘I’ve met geologists, and I’ve met chemists, but I’ve never met a geologist with a setup anything like you’ve got in your lab.’

‘That is hardly a surprise. Most people do not have the backing I do.’

‘Yes, but…’ Good lord, this man is frustrating. ‘What are you even looking at? People have known there’s coal here for hundreds of years now, surely Riddle didn’t hire you to tell him that. Are you looking at ore quality? Or something to do with processing?’

Snape says nothing, so Remus presses the point. ‘Or are you looking at something environmental? I know that quite a few sites have quite bad contamination problems, I’m sure you get plenty of work monitoring local watercourses and the like, making sure everything’s within regulations.’

‘There aren’t any problems with the water’, Snape hisses. ‘The mine is fine, and it will be more than fine if you get on with doing your job and let the approval for the construction go ahead!’

‘Of course,’ Remus says quickly. ‘We can’t rush these things, obviously, but I’ll do my best to finish up soon.’

_I might make a bad spy, but Severus Snape would make an even worse one. Definitely the water._

* * *

Sirius realises his hands are shaking.

He’s been staring at a crumpled piece of paper for close to sixteen hours now, waiting by the phone. He hadn’t even gone to bed, really, just sat on the couch, staring stupidly at the scrap of paper he was handed, and eventually he dozed off, the feeling of Remus’ warm eyes watching him.

Yeah, that’s creepy, but he feels safe, okay? Sue him. (Don’t sue him, please, he’s been practically disowned and while he’s hardly destitute he’s not in a position to pay for lawsuits, either.)

It’s stupid. His phone isn’t going to ring, Remus doesn’t have his number. Nothing is happening until he picks up the phone and dials _him_.

Which would be easier if his hands would stop shaking.

What the fuck is wrong with him? Sirius thought he knew what his type was, see, and it definitely wasn’t mild-mannered academics in oversized cardigans with an addiction to chocolate. Sirius wears his leather jacket like armour and his torn jeans and long, messy hair with pride, and he falls in love hard and fast, rebelliously. But he falls for the rebels, the other boys with their gleaming bikes and cigarettes dangling from callused fingers (nothing like Sirius’ own- despite his best efforts, he still has the long, soft fingers of an aristocrat who’s never worked a day in his life).

He does _not_ fall in love with straight-laced, probably straight academics that treat him with fond exasperation at best.

Except, apparently, he does.

Fuck.

He breathes out, shakily. He’s Sirius Fucking Black. He’s brave. He’s escaped from his shitty and walked into a world he barely understood without a backwards glance. He’s built a life for himself.

He’s brave.

He can be brave for this.

He picks up the phone, his fingers hovering over the numbers.

He wasn’t there to see Remus, this morning. He wonders if he missed him. Or if he was relieved not to have to deal with his bullshit when he rounded that corner.

One way to find out.

Remus’ mobile rings for what feels like all eternity but is probably less than ten seconds. Funny how time works like that.

Ask about the thing- the samples thing- then ask if he wants to meet, maybe. Easy. Simple. If he misinterprets it then fine, we can meet for the samples thing and Sirius can try again, more openly. If Remus rejects him then, well, he’ll deal. Somehow. Until then, just calling about samples. Just calling about the samples.

The ringtone stops. He can hear someone on the other end of the phone, breathing.

He can do this. He’s Sirius Fucking Black. He can do this.

‘Hey, Remus, this is Sirius- um, I was wondering if you had any ideas about the samples?’

Nice opener, Sirius, he thinks. So eloquent. He’ll be swept off his feet.

‘What samples?’

That is not Remus Lupin’s voice.

Worse, Sirius knows exactly whose voice it is.

_FUCK_.

It goes downhill from there; which Sirius honestly didn’t think was possible. Severus Snape isn’t a complete idiot, as much as Sirius might wish he was. He knows exactly who’s been waiting on the road outside the mine for the past several weeks, right in Remus Lupin’s path for several days now. (Yeah, Sirius had been bored out of his skull for ages now. Sue him. (Don’t sue him). Apparently, life without getting into screaming matches with his parents was kind of really fucking boring, and his track record for holding down jobs was, uh. Not great. He’d needed something to do and waiting at the mine at least meant he bothered to get up in the mornings.)

Logically, Sirius has taken samples from the mine land. Logically, he’s working with Remus. Logically, Remus’ archaeological assessment was just the way to get in the door. (Okay, that’s unfair. He definitely hadn’t been planning that before, but it’s not like Snivellus would believe _him_ ).

Severus Snape kicks Remus Lupin out of the building within five minutes of Sirius’ call.

_God_. If he’s just waited a couple more hours. He knows Remus’ timetable, he should’ve realised _he_ would be there- hadn’t they been joking about Snape’s stalkerish habits, just a few days ago? Why couldn’t he think. Why the _fuck_ was he such a useless, lovesick fool that he couldn’t even wait a couple more hours.

And now he’s wrecked it. Remus has lost his job, undoubtedly, and it’s Sirius’ fault. He’ll never want-’

‘Sirius, can you come? To the usual place?’

‘… yeah’, he rasps. Remus is going to hate him and if he wants to say so in person- well, he’s definitely entitled to. The disaster which is Sirius Black just fucked up his entirely life. Remus Lupin is well within his rights to say exactly that to his face.

The ride out feels like an execution march, but he keeps his course. It’s all his fault. He’s got to face the fucking consequences.

Remus beat him there, of course. His car- barely a car, more duct tape than car, Sirius has been saving up jokes for days to make about it and now he’ll never get to use them- is parked on the edge of the road. Remus himself is leaning against the bonnet, staring out at the road, his fingers tapping out an unsteady rhythm on the hood.

Sirius takes a moment, as he pulls up, to memorise the way the sunlight falls through Remus’ hair. Then he pulls off his helmet and begins to walk over, unsteadily. Remus pushes himself off the bonnet and comes to meet him in the middle, and Sirius can’t take it anymore.

‘God, Remus, I’m sorry, I wasn’t thinking, I never do, fuck, it’s all my fault-’

‘Sirius’, Remus says, but he can’t stop-

‘I’m sorry, Snape’s gonna go tell all his buddies about this-’

‘Sirius.’

‘-and they’re going to spread the word, oh god, Remus-’

‘Sirius.’

‘-I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I fucked up so bad-’

‘Sirius, I don’t care.’

‘You’re going to hate me- wait, _what?_ ’

‘I don’t care’. Remus looks hesitant for a moment, and then his jaw tightens with resolve. ‘This job was shit anyway. You basically did me a favour, giving me an out.’

‘But- they’ll cause trouble.’

‘Yeah, well. You’ve got the samples, right? We can probably cause plenty of trouble right back at them.’

The sun is shining, and- what. The sun shouldn’t be shining, this is supposed to be the shittiest moment of his life, here! Come on, universe. Give him the right moody aesthetics. Plenty of dark angry clouds, please. He’s just fucked over Remus’ life, it shouldn’t seem so damn cheerful.

A small bit of his brain is trying to say that Remus shouldn’t look so damn cheerful if Sirius just ruined his life, but he’s trying to force it to shut up, because false hope is a terrible thing which can please go die already.

‘Oh, I’ve got them, but I definitely don’t have a lab. And you said, people won’t take ‘em. Not if it’ll put them against Riddle Inc.’

‘I’ve probably got a few contacts’, Remus reassures- _reassures_ \- him. ‘Someone will do the work. We’ll make it work, Sirius.’

‘… Wait, “we”?’

‘Uh…’ _Remus_ is the awkward looking one, now, peering up at him through a floppy fringe that has no right being as adorable as it is, especially on a man who’s already going prematurely grey, which mostly makes him look dignified, except when he laughs, and then he looks so full of life it almost hurts. Fuck off, brain, Sirius thinks. Not a helpful thought right now.

‘I was kind of hoping you’d be willing to stick around’, Remus says, nervously. ‘After all, um…’

‘You- you still want to see me? After this?’

‘If you’re willing to keep me around,’ Remus says, and oh god, Sirius should be the one comforting him, Remus probably just lost his _job_ , but apparently it’s happening the other way around-

They’re close, now, but Sirius can’t bring himself to meet Remus’ eyes, can’t bring himself to see the cruel lie- or, worse, the possibility that he’s actually telling the truth. Instead he focuses on Remus’ cardigan, the frayed cuffs where he’s picked away at the stitches, forces his gaze upwards, where the cardigan- which should be tight fitting- falls off of Remus’ collarbone. God, he’s so thin.

‘Um,’ Sirius says, not raising his gaze from Remus’ shoulder. ‘So, when you made that comment the other day about finding a girlfriend, well, that wasn’t really going to happen. And I was wondering. Well.’

One of Remus’ hands lands on his shoulder, gently. He makes the mistake of looking up. The other man is smiling.

‘Would this bit work better if I asked, do you think?’

‘I’ve, um. I’ve got a sign,’ Sirius stammers in return. Remus stares at him incredulously.

He’d torn his anti-mining sign in half, at some point. Probably in the haze of self-loathing just before he came out here. But, somehow, the half which is jammed awkwardly into the pannier, had been digging into his hip the whole way out-

They’re closer to the motorbike than he thought they were, it’s only a few steps and he’s pulling it out with trembling hands.

‘BE MINE’, Remus says. Then he pauses. ‘Seriously- no, don’t do the name pun, it was bad enough the first time. You mean it? Also, like this?’

‘Question mark on the end, of course’, Sirius says, because apparently his mouth and his brain are on completely different planes of existence right now. ‘I’m not going to force you into anything, but, well. I like you?’

It’s not a conscious move for either of them, what happens next.

Their lips find each other and they kiss, hungrily, and- _fuck_ \- Sirius thought Remus would be gentle but he’s not, there’s something fierce and possessive in the other man’s embrace. He wasn’t expecting it but he finds himself falling into it, all the tension and hatred he’d been building draining away in a moment because _Remus Lupin does not hate him_. He’s… okay. He’s Sirius _fucking_ Black and he’s actually okay.

‘I don’t think we need a question mark on the end of that,’ Remus gasps, once they finally stop to breathe. Sirius can’t help it. He starts laughing hysterically.

‘You’re talking about grammar? Now? You really are an academic, aren’t you?’

‘You’re the one who brought it up.’ Gentle teasing. Like this is normal.

Sirius thinks he could come to like this normal.

‘Guess that’s fair,’ he mutters, collapsing against Remus’ shoulder. ‘So, are we just gonna stand here for a while? Not that that’s a problem, mind you…’

‘Well…’ there’s mischief in Remus’ voice, and he can’t help but sit up and listen. If there’s one way to get Sirius’ attention it’s to promise chaos of some kind.

‘I was wondering, do you still have all the toilet paper from that stupid mummy costume? Only I saw a way past the gate of the mining complex, and I have a strong urge to do something very childish to their front door.’ 

Sirius gapes. He can’t help it. How the hell did he manage to find someone so perfect?

‘Remus Lupin, will you marry me?’

‘Bit early for that, don’t you think, dear?’ Remus grins. ‘I think you’d better make another sign first.’


End file.
